Welcome to part four of my series on how to “Quickly Build a Multi-Server SharePoint 2013 Developer Environment”. In this section I am going discuss how to configure SharePoint servers and prepare our last two VMs. We’ll be using a series of tools to accomplish this, including AutoSPSourceBuilder and AutoSPInstaller (which if you followed the prep from part two you already have downloaded and ready to go). The other thing we are going to do that has been different than the steps done so far is we are going to configure both SP servers and then install SharePoint and configure the farm all at once. To do this we will be using the remote installation option that AutoSPInstaller gives us.

Prep the SharePoint App Server

As seen in the previous posts; before we can install anything we first have to configure the server (can’t copy over our files until then). So let’s start off with the following script to allow us to run ps1 files later:

Lower Server Script Security on App Server

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Set-ExecutionPolicyunrestricted

Next run the following script to set the server name, configure network settings, enable remote desktop, disable firewall and a few other things.

It is more likely that we are going to use the WFE for testing with client tools, but just in case, let’s enable the Desktop Experience here too. We’ll reboot the server when we are done:

Enable Desktop Experience

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#Enable Desktop Experience and Reboot Server

Add-WindowsFeatureDesktop-Experience

Restart-Computer

Prep the SharePoint Web Server

The steps here are pretty much exactly the same, but I separated out the scripts as I didn’t want the server names and IP Addresses to get mixed together. As with the App server you need to ensure you can run PowerShell scripts on the server:

The script will copy the binaries to the destination as well as the prerequisites to be used by AutoSPInstaller.

When prompted for: “Please type the name of an available CU:” enter the CU you wish to download and slipstream and press Enter. At one time there was an issue slipstreaming SharePoint 2013 CUs, but this has since been rectified. If you do not wish to slipstream your build you will need to remove the CU listing from the AutoSPSourceBuilder xml config file.

Only perform this step if you choose to not slipstream your install with a CU. Do this after or while the source is being built. Download the latest CU that you wish to install in your farm. (https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn789211(v=office.14).aspx#BKMK_2013). Unzip the exe and .cab files into c:\SharePoint\SP\2013\Updates

Finally, copy your C:\SharePoint folder from the App server to the C: drive of all of your other SharePoint servers.
That’s it. Everything is ready for you to move to the SharePoint servers and install. Except one thing. We still need to create an AutoSPInstaller answer file.